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Norbert Hofer with FPO party leader HC Strache. PAimages/Ronald Zak. All rights reserved.A few weeks ago, Austria narrowly avoided a
far-right presidency in an election that marked the end of an era. For the
first time, no candidate of Austria’s Social or Christian Democratic catch-all
parties - or rather, former catch-all parties - had made it to the run-off.

The
parties that governed in a grand coalition for much of the country’s post-1945
history were crushed in the first round of the election, their candidates
placed a distant fourth and fifth. And while half of Austria and liberals
across Europe heaved a sigh of relief when former Green party chairman
Alexander van der Bellen narrowly defeated the Freedom Party’s Norbert Hofer,
the result was a pyrrhic victory at best.

“The effort in this election campaign is not
wasted, but is an investment for the future” Hofer stated on his Facebook page after conceding
his defeat. And the campaign was indeed an indication of what might come. With 34 % in the latest polls, the Freedom Party is leading by a
large margin. The presidential election has shown that its potential to
mobilise voters goes much further. A far-right president might have been
averted. A far-right chancellor is more likely than ever.

In the presidential election, 49.7 % of
Austrian voters voted for a far-right political agenda. The remaining 50.3 %
primarily voted against this agenda rather than for a coherent
alternative. The election of the liberal, progressive and Europhile van der
Bellen should not be mistaken for endorsement of his political views. His
victory is the result of the concerted effort of very different, very disunited
political forces that wanted to prevent the Freedom Party’s grip on
political power at any cost. Had it not been for the country’s
polarisation, a candidate with van der Bellen’s profile would not have stood a
chance.

How did all this happen? In the German cultural TV show
Aspekte, the Austrian writer Robert Menasse recently explained why so many
Austrians turned to the Freedom Party. He explained it to a German
audience that – in spite of proximity, shared language and common cultural and
historical heritage – is remarkably ignorant about the politics of its southern
neighbour.

As is the rest of the world. Austria and its
capital Vienna in particular have an excellent international reputation (only
tarnished by the occasional bizarre crime involving young women and
subterranean dungeons). A lovely little affluent Alpine country on the banks of
the Danube River, a place to go for skiing or to enjoy its rich cultural and
culinary heritage. Or its secretive banking practices.

But while the strength of Norbert Hofer’s
presidential candidacy caught many foreign observers off guard, it was hardly
unexpected. In a powerful 18-minute monologue, Menasse offers an
explanation of contemporary Austria that sheds light on how past and on-going
developments facilitate the flirt with fascism. Acknowledging the disruptions
of globalization and the European Union’s multiple crises, he identifies three
specifically Austrian factors that aided the Freedom Party’s
instrumentalisation of voters’ anxiety: Austria’s previous catch-all parties’
reaction to the rise of the far right, the country’s “Austrofascist” heritage and
its flawed constitution.

Since the rise of Jörg Haider who
re-invented Austria’s Freedom Party as a pan-Germanic and far-right force in
the 1990s, the party proves to have a potential of around 30% of the electorate.
Panicking in the light of its electoral success and hoping to steal its
thunder, the dominant Social Democrats and Christian Democrats systematically
started to appropriate Freedom Party demands and rhetoric, and to
translate them into policy.

Rather than providing actual solutions for
those sectors in dire need of structural reform, the centrist parties borrowed
the far right’s simplistic slogans and scapegoats. “So we don’t have problems
with public finance and education or a crisis of the welfare state and the
pension system. No, we only have a problem with foreigners.” Such arguments
frustrated the centrist parties’ core constituents. Meanwhile supporters of the
far-right and a range of swing voters found the Freedom Party’s views
confirmed. And they started to feel that their demands could have become policy
much earlier if the Freedom Party had been in government.

“Many voters say ‘Now the Social Democrats
say what the Freedom Party has always said, the Christian Democrats say what
the Freedom Party has always said and the Greens live on the moon. But the
Freedom party has always said it, and therefore we vote for them now’. And this
explains how a man like Hofer appears out of nowhere and suddenly manages to
get the most votes in the first round, six million votes more than the runner
up, while the Social Democrats and Christian Democrats have so few voters they
can greet all of them with a personal handshake.”

But why did Austria provide such fertile
ground for the rise of a far-right party in the first place? And why are even
voters from the political centre susceptible to their ideas, rhetoric and
demands? According to Menasse, there is a historical constant in Austrian
politics whose presence has widely been overlooked: “There is a continuity in
the desire for authoritarian politics, for a consequent right-wing nationalist
politics, I would go as far as to say for fascist politics. This desire is
widely spread in Austria, for reasons that all those looking to Austria from
abroad, and the Germans in particular, always forget.”

In post-1945 Germany, it became absolutely
clear to everyone including the most ignorant people that nothing good was to
be found in the Nazi period and that its glorification was unacceptable. On a
political level, it became impossible to translate fascist views into relevant
and sustainable electoral success.

Austria did experience National Socialism as
well. In fact, rather than provoking resistance comparable to other states
annexed by Nazi Germany, the ‘Anschluss’ of Austria to the German Reich was met
with significant popular support. However, although many argue that the review
and reappraisal of National Socialism was inadequate, it was largely
discredited in post-1945 Austria as well. What was not discredited, however,
was Austria’s very own version of fascism created five years before its
annexation.

Facing the loss of his parliamentary
majority, the Austrian chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss dissolved the parliament
in 1933 and replaced the democratic system with a fascist corporate
dictatorship. Supported by the Catholic Church and the Union of Austrian
fraternities, the new regime eliminated the constitutional court, banned
competing parties, established internment camps for political opponents, took
control over the education system and reinstituted capital punishment for a
range of offences including civil unrest and rioting.

And while Austria half-heartedly came to
terms with its Nationalist Socialist period, there was never any serious
reappraisal of Austrofascism. In fact, quite the contrary happened. Austria’s
homemade fascist leader was romanticized as a resistance fighter because he had
rejected the unification with Germany and was ultimately assassinated in a
failed coup attempt by Austrian Nazis.

“Austrofascism was never questioned. In
fact, Dollfuss was seen as a patriotic leader who stood up to Hitler. That he
was also a fascist was conveniently ignored” says Menasse. “As a result,
fascist ideas, mindsets and traditions derived from Austrofascism could live
on, hidden under the label of patriotism. In Austria, patriotism is a
synonym for Austrofascist attitudes. And this is also the reason for Austria’s
political divide. The Left refers to the Freedom Party’s politicians and voters
as Nazis. They, in turn, are outraged, because actually they are not Nazis.
They are Austrofascists, which is bad enough.”

According to Menasse, this Austrofascistheritage has increasingly resurfaced in recent years. As in other countries, many
Austrians are afraid of being left behind in a world that has started to move
too fast for some. Globalization and its disruptive symptoms such as the
financial crisis or the recent migration movements leave them worried about
what they see as threats to their way of life and their economic well-being. In
such a climate, the existing underlying fascist and nationalist currents gains
traction again and many start to call for a strong man and a strong party that
offers simple solutions and strong leadership.

These sympathies for authoritarian
leadership go hand in hand with a deeply rooted scepticism towards democracy,
which Menasse partly attributes to the rather peculiar role of the Austrian
constitution: “The constitution has been violated on a daily basis since the
very foundation of the Austrian republic. Because it has been replaced by what
is referred to as the ‘Actual Constitution’. The constitution says that
parliament makes laws. However, in reality most laws are made by the social
partners who meet and negotiate behind closed doors. When these laws get to
parliament their approval is a formality.”

Moreover, whenever the government wanted to
implement a law that did not comply with the constitution, it was just declared
a ‘constitutional law’ by a two-thirds majority in parliament. Obtaining such a
majority was fairly easy as Austria was largely governed by grand coalitions.
As a result, even laws that were in stark contradiction to Austria’s or indeed
any country’s basic constitutional principles became part of the constitution
and were thus taken out of the jurisdiction of the constitutional court. As Menasse
put it, “this meant that the constitution was not only systematically violated
but ended up as an utter ruin.”

The constant violation of the constitution
and the secondary role of parliament did not overly concern the Austrians as it
went hand in hand with increasing wealth. But it did lead to a rather strange
understanding of democracy. “After finally getting a democratic republic and a
parliament, what did the Austrians learn over the course of at least three
generations? They learned that the parliament is irrelevant and that democracy
manifests itself in increasing wealth – a rather strange definition of
democracy. And on top of that they learned that the constitution does not
matter either, because after all it was systematically violated.”

Ironically, it was the Freedom Party’s
Norbert Hofer of all people who pledged to take the Austrian constitution
seriously if elected president. Because although previous incumbents have
interpreted the presidency as a largely ceremonial office, the constitution
actually grants the president significant powers. He is entitled to dismiss the
government, dissolve the parliament, nominate a chancellor and govern the
country by emergency decrees for up to four weeks. Formally, he is even the
supreme commander of the Armed Forces.

“This is a left-over of Austrofascism that
somehow stayed in the constitution. Every president in the second republic
said: ‘Well, I know this is in the constitution, but we are not going to do it
that way.’ But then someone came along and said that he is going to do it that
way. And as a result, all democratically minded people panicked. And rightly so.
Because the Austrian constitution allows for fascism, and in the worst case
only the violation of the constitution could have prevented it.”

We will never know what Norbert Hofer would
have made of the presidency and the constitutional powers formally bequeathed
to it. "You will be surprised what is going to be possible”, he said in a televised debate that set off alarm bells among his
opponents.

It seems likely, however, that Hofer would
not have taken any drastic action. And in all fairness, even some of the
victorious Alexander van der Bellen’s campaign rhetoric sounded as if Austria was
a presidential democracy.

A president Hofer would probably have made
an effort to appear like a serious, respectable statesman. He would have been
the Freedom Party’s friendly and trustworthy face. He would have done his best
to appear acceptable to the political mainstream while carefully using the
reputation and the resources that come with the office to gradually shift this
mainstream further to the right. He would have used the presidential authority
to make the Freedom Party and its agenda more acceptable to the political
centre and thus to continue paving the way for its electoral victory. And if it
had reached an all-time high in the polls at some point during his presidency,
he would have called an early election.

The Freedom Party did not manage to get the
presidency this time. But if one is to believe Robert Menasse, the potential
for far right majorities is here to stay. One might not agree with all of his
analysis, but he certainly provides a compelling explanation of contemporary
Austria.

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